By Dan Ambrose: Without a doubt, 29-year-old Amir Khan will be giving away a great deal of weight in his contest with WBC middleweight champion Saul “Canelo” Alvarez. Just how much weight that Khan will be giving up in this fight will depend a lot on how the two fighters train for their May 7 fight in Las Vegas, Nevada.
Khan is already talking about bulking up. However, he feels that Canelo’s weight advantage, which he feels will only be 10 pounds, won’t be the deciding factor in the title fight on HBO PPV. Khan feels that the fight will come down to his boxing skills, and he feels that he’s the better fighter with the faster speed than the “flat-footed” Canelo.
“My boxing skills will win this fight. Weight will not win this fight. Canelo may come in about 10 pounds heavier than me but I’m not concern about his weight,” Khan said to RingTV.com. “My speed and athleticism will be the key the factors to winning this fight. Staying focused throughout the fight.”
If all Canelo is going to have is a 10 pound weight advantage over Khan in this fight, then we could see a mini-upset on 5/7. But something tells me that Canelo is going to be sporting more than a 10-pound advantage in weight. Khan is talking about coming into the fight from 160 to 165. For the sake of argument, let’s assume that Khan does come into the fight at 165.
I still Canelo will have more than a 10-pound weight advantage in this fight. In looking at how big Canelo was in his last fight against Miguel Cotto. He appeared to me to be in the 180s rather than 170s. I’ve never seen Canelo look so big before during his career, and it’s very odd that he didn’t get weighed by HBO for that fight specifically. Canelo normally weighs in before his fights, but for some reason Canelo’s weight wasn’t given by HBO. I’m not sure if Canelo refused to be weighed by HBO or what.
All I know is Canelo looked bigger to me than he’s ever looked before. For that reason, I think Canelo will be in the 180s for the Khan fight. Canelo might choose to use this training camp to work on speed rather than power. Canelo was in the 160s for his fight against Floyd Mayweather Jr. two years ago. However, that was when Canelo was younger, so it was easier for him to drop down below the 170s. I don’t know that Canelo can drop his weight to the high 160s any longer. I wouldn’t be surprised that Canelo struggles to get down even to 170.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F8n79Bz94nw
Khan would be smart not to put on too much weight for this fight because he’s going to need as much speed as possible to avoid getting nailed by Canelo. It’s no good if Khan bulks up to 165, and gets tired after a couple of rounds of trying to move around the ring. If Khan gets tired against Canelo, then I see him getting taken out.
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